That last order seems ripe for reversal. It's one thing to say that issuance of a complaint which seeks relief inherently inconsistent with a petition should result in dismissing that petition; quite another for a complaint which seeks relief CONSISTENT with a petition to result in dismissing it. That's perverse, and surely employees shouldn't be somehow punished for their employer's unfair labor practices by being locked out of representation for several years while the ULP case is pending. (Filing a new petition is a risky move-- if the second election results go against the union, that will likely deal a fatal blow to attempts to secure representation through a bargaining order-- but as long as the prounion employees understand that risk, the RD shouldn't paternalistically get in their way.)
There are a plethora of cases under the Gissel standard in which the Board issued bargaining orders even though the union had won the election (presumably because the employer was attempting to fight those election results). That-- not insisting on weirdly freezing the status quo-- is the correct result here.
That last order seems ripe for reversal. It's one thing to say that issuance of a complaint which seeks relief inherently inconsistent with a petition should result in dismissing that petition; quite another for a complaint which seeks relief CONSISTENT with a petition to result in dismissing it. That's perverse, and surely employees shouldn't be somehow punished for their employer's unfair labor practices by being locked out of representation for several years while the ULP case is pending. (Filing a new petition is a risky move-- if the second election results go against the union, that will likely deal a fatal blow to attempts to secure representation through a bargaining order-- but as long as the prounion employees understand that risk, the RD shouldn't paternalistically get in their way.)
There are a plethora of cases under the Gissel standard in which the Board issued bargaining orders even though the union had won the election (presumably because the employer was attempting to fight those election results). That-- not insisting on weirdly freezing the status quo-- is the correct result here.